July 31: Holiday Auto Theatre, Hamilton OH

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It’s Day 211 of my virtual Drive-In-a-Day Odyssey. I crossed over to Ohio for the start of a new movie week, taking almost three hours to drive from one Holiday to another, from the Holiday Drive-In Theatre in Mitchell IN to the Holiday Auto Theatre in Hamilton OH.

According to Cinema Treasures, the Holiday opened in September 1948 as the Hamilton Outdoor Theatre. CT says the name was changed in 1951 to Holiday Auto Theatre, but an article in The Miami Student says it changed when National Amusements bought it in late 1948. Cinema Treasures’ timeline seems more likely.

“It changed hands a few times over the years,” wrote the Student, and that fact holds up well. The 1948-49 Theatre Catalog lists Louis Aldt as the owner, and the International Motion Picture Almanac has “L. Olt” owning the place in 1959. I think somebody misspelled that name. Making it more confusing is that in between, Ben Cohen was listed as the owner in 1956.

There’s another ownership snapshot in 1998 when Cincinnati Magazine included then-owner Fred Baum in its discussion of regional drive-ins. “To describe Baum as passionate about his drive-in is to seriously underplay the man’s obsession,” it wrote. The grounds and concession stand were impeccable, and “the much-modified projector, with its 4,500-watt xenon bulb, produces an immaculate image on the huge screen.”

A Cinema Treasures commenter said Baum passed away on Memorial Day 2007 at age 64. “Current co-owner Gregory Reinhold and The Holiday employees continue to operate this venue as Fred would have wished, even though Baum put the Drive -In up for sale in 2006.”

Cincinnati Magazine wrote that Todd Chancey and Mark Althoetmar, a pair of Disney employees (former, in Chancey’s case), bought the Holiday in 2007. They converted it to digital projection before the 2013 season. “The challenge is you have to get a machine strong and large enough to get the light to the screen,” Chancey said.

The YouTube video from this post comes from a viewer of WXIX, Cincinnati’s News Leader, who recorded a live remote at the Holiday for New Years Eve 2009. While it was nice to see Chancey talk about his preparations, for me the video is worth watching just for that great view of the drive-in marquee at night. (The tradition continued; in 2012, USA Today listed the Holiday among its 10 great places for a family-friendly New Year’s Eve.)

This was the third time I’ve seen the latest Planet of the Apes installment, but the loud action makes it a pretty good drive-in movie. Anything’s better than The Emoji Movie.

Miles Today / Total:  132 / 26282 (rounded to the nearest mile)

Movie Showing / Total Active Nights: War for the Planet of the Apes / 127

Nearby Restaurant: At Lindenwald Station, they serve breakfast all day, which made me happy after a drive that took practically all morning. I heard the biscuits and gravy were worth it, and of course they were. At lunch, I had a half order plus a “Cattle Car” omelette (the station has a neat locomotive theme) packed with ham, bacon, sausage, and cheese, then topped with more gravy. Which is why I wasn’t hungry for dinner.

Where I Virtually Stayed: Even though Hamilton is a much larger town than many I’ve seen lately (population 62,000 or so) and is close to Cincinnati, there’s only one hotel in town. Good thing it’s a Courtyard, and an especially good one at that. I haven’t written about Courtyards much, because they’re usually found where business travelers want to be, but they’re pretty reliable. My freshly renovated king room had a mini-fridge and a coffee maker, and breakfast was available for purchase.

Only in Hamilton: Roadside America has the whole story of the Hollow Earth Monument. It marks the gravesite of John Cleves Symmes Jr., hero of the War of 1812, who later announced that the Earth was hollow with giant holes at the North and South Poles. He died in 1829 and was buried in his family’s cemetery. When that was turned into a park in the 1840s, all of its bodies were dug up and moved to a new cemetery — except for John Cleves Symmes Jr. It was around this time that Symmes’ son erected the Hollow Earth Monument, topped by a globe with hole through its middle, inscribed with Symmes’ belief that “the Earth is hollow and habitable within.”

Next stop: Starlite Drive-In Theatre, Amelia OH.

July 30: Holiday Drive-In Theatre, Mitchell IN

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It’s Day 211 of my virtual Drive-In-a-Day Odyssey. It took just a half hour to drive from the Starlite Drive-In Theatre south of Bloomington IN to the Holiday Drive-In Theatre south of Mitchell IN.

Actually, the Holiday is about halfway between Mitchell and Orleans IN. It opened in 1962, owned by George Webb and Theodore Stigall. In 1983, Robert Limeberry bought the Holiday and kept it running until he passed away. The current owner, Steve Wilson, bought the Holiday from Limeberry’s estate in the winter of 2005.

Wilson went one important step further, purchasing the Holiday’s land in January 2008. We’ve seen plenty of examples where drive-ins were forced to close because the landowner decided to sell. That didn’t happen in this dot on the highway surrounded by farm land. “We’re kind of lucky from the standpoint it sits in a corn field,” Wilson told the Electric Consumer in September 2008. “If it sat anywhere else, somebody would have had it torn down.”

The Holiday dodged another problem common to drive-ins this decade. Wilson launched a GoFundMe campaign in 2015 to raise the money for a digital projector. “We have started this Go fund Me page, to bring awareness to the high possibility of losing this theater,” it said. The campaign raised only a little more than $10,000, but before the start of the 2016 season, Wilson found an older digital projector from a defunct Hazard KY indoor theater, thanks in part to Jim Boyd, owner of the Van-Del Drive-In in Middle Point OH.

According to the Bedford Times-Mail (subscription required), the result was a huge success.  “Last year, we had probably the biggest April we’ve ever had,” Wilson said. And this year he opened earlier than usual, in mid-March, to take advantage of the buzz around the live-action Beauty and the Beast.

Speaking of buzz, I’ve embedded another drone video, again from last year. On this one, instead of hearing the whirring blades, the videographer added old-time movie scratch effects because, uh, 1962 movie theater setting, uh … okay, I don’t get it. But the views make the video definitely worth watching.

This was the fourth time I’ve seen the latest Transformers installment, but the loud action makes it a pretty good drive-in movie. I couldn’t recall another drive-in that rents lawn chairs, but that might have been because of all the cinnamon sugar mini-donuts I ate there.

Miles Today / Total:  27 / 26150 (rounded to the nearest mile)

Movie Showing / Total Active Nights: Transformers: The Last Knight / 126

Nearby Restaurant: The Millstone Dining Room in the Spring Mill Inn in Spring Mill State Park has a well-deserved reputation for some really great fried chicken. Add that it’s served in a buffet setting, and you’ve got two ingredients for a great experience, at least the way I rank these things. The dessert bar featured cornmeal pie and persimmon pudding. You can’t find food like this just anywhere.

Where I Virtually Stayed: The only real place to stay in Mitchell is the Spring Mill Inn inside Spring Mill State Park just east of town. My room was a lot different than what I’d find at a chain hotel, with a wooden rocker, a DVD player, a real quilt on the bed, and that’s about it. Good thing there was wifi, because cell reception was pretty spotty this far out in such a peaceful setting.

Only in Mitchell: The Mitchell Opera House opened in 1906 as the County Hall. In 1908, Menlo E. Moore took over its operation, renaming it the Opera House. For over 20 years, it hosted live shows, silent movies, and political rallies. The building had several other uses (storage, teen center, city hall) from 1930 to 1981, when it was reopened for occasional shows. After a full renovation, it reopened permanently in July 2015.

Next stop: Holiday Auto Theatre, Hamilton OH.

July 29: Starlite Drive-In Theatre, Bloomington IN

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It’s Day 210 of my virtual Drive-In-a-Day Odyssey. It started with an easy one-hour drive from Franklin IN to the Starlite Drive-In Theatre south of Bloomington IN.

The Starlite opened in 1955, built by Carl and Ruth Stewart, who operated it for 48 years until Ruth passed away in 2003. According to his 95th birthday salute in 2014 in the Bloomington Herald-Times (subscription required), Carl “took pride in making the best popcorn and getting to know the families.”

The next owner was Cindy Jarvis and family. According to Indiana Public Media, “She wanted to have people think they were coming back to 1955 when they entered the drive-in, so it was her decision to not use the credit card machines.” Jarvis had to commute from out of town, and the Starlite’s had deteriorated a bit when it was sold in December 2013.

The next owner was a local guy, Mark Freeman, and his family. Indiana Public Media said he went right to work fixing panels on the screen, fixed the water and gas lines, added fresh gravel and made other cosmetic improvements. He added a fence to prevent patrons from walking in front of the projector, which inspired more work. “Once we did that,” Freeman said, “we started looking and said ‘Wow.” So we just made this patio here.” The patio, in front of the projection room, has tables and chairs.

Freeman also added credit card payments and a digital projector, which made it a little odd that he sold the Starlite this February. (I wrote about that when it happened.) Now the drive-in’s owner is the Brent Barnhart family and KJB Theaters. Barnhart told the Herald-Times, “I’m thrilled to take up the baton and run with it.”

Ah, it’s nice to have another drone video to share. This one’s was posted in June 2015 and is unusual that it’s audio is the real sound of the drone. I’ve been around enough of them to verify – they’re noisy little things.

I feel bad that my timing made me miss the Starlite’s many special shows – this coming Tuesday will be Forrest Gump, and Wednesday will be Enter the Dragon. But my wish from the night before went unanswered, and I sat through The Emoji Movie for the second straight evening. As I type two days after this movie’s release, IMDB voters have already pushed it to 22nd place of the worst of all time, six slots worse than Monster a-Go-Go and considerably worse than Battlefield Earth. Telling fact: Sir Patrick Stewart is the voice of Poop.

Miles Today / Total:  51 / 26123 (rounded to the nearest mile)

Movie Showing / Total Active Nights: The Emoji Movie / 125

Nearby Restaurant: How can you not love a place named Darn Good Soup? I mean, you know right away what you’re going to get, plus there’s homemade bread. I had the Cheesy Tomatillo followed by a scoop of chocolate lover’s ice cream. Simple and great!

Where I Virtually Stayed: The Hilton Garden Inn is a perennial favorite of mine whenever I find one, partly because my Hilton Honors status gets me free breakfast there. The HGI here is taller than most, six stories, and it has a parking garage. That’s all probably because Indiana University is so close by. My room had the full set of amenities, the staff was friendly, and the breakfast buffet was great.

Only in Bloomington: Indiana University in Bloomington features a 12,000-pound brain, “the largest anatomically accurate brain sculpture in the U.S.” near the entrance to its Psychology Building. In 2015, they made a good thing even better by adding an interactive lighting display which “will respond to movement and feature shifting colors and patterns, which will change with the seasons or to recognize special events, such as pink for Breast Cancer Awareness Month or crimson for IU sports victories.”

Next stop: Holiday Drive-In Theatre, Mitchell IN.